Twice Tempted (15 page)

Fiona unlocked the door with sweaty hands and picked the poker back up. Tiptoeing out of the room, she turned to close and lock the door, to keep Mairead safe, when she smelled it.

Oh, no. She whipped around and stared over the banister. It couldn’t be. Not in her poor little school.

It was. Smoke.

Poker in hand, she spun around and fumbled with the lock.

“Fire!” she yelled, shoving the door open and pushing Mairead almost out of the bed.

Mairead popped up like a jack-in-the-box, blinking.

“Hurry, Mae!” Fiona urged, bending to pick up shoes and hurl Mairead’s at her head. “We must get out.”

“Mrs. Quick,” Mae answered, catching the slippers and shoving her feet into them.

“Her, too. Come. And take this.” Shoving the warming pan into Mairead’s hand, Fiona turned back to the hallway. There should be no lights in the house except the faint wash of moonlight. No sound but the fretful pop and moan of old wood. No smell beside beeswax and mutton from dinner. But smoke lent the air a sharp edge. A shuddering fall of orange washed the walls, and Fiona heard a crackling that didn’t bode well. And even in the faint moonlight Fiona could see the fingers of smoke wrapping around the spindles of the banister.

She grabbed Mairead’s free hand and headed for the stair. Then she stopped, planted Mairead, and ran back for the pillow. If they lost that, there would be no consoling her sister.

“Why am I wielding a copper pan?” Mairead asked sleepily.

Fiona dragged Mairead down the stairs. “Because I heard someone downstairs right before I smelled the smoke.”

“And if we see him, we’ll bash him?”

“We’ll bash him two feet shorter,” Fiona assured her, hoping she sounded positive.

She was terrified. The flames were licking up the schoolroom door and along the wall. Fiona reached the bottom floor and turned for the back of the house.

“Mrs. Quick!” she yelled. “Fire! Get out!”

There was no one else in the house. The intruder must have escaped. On the way by the schoolroom, Fiona saw her precious slates piled on a floor littered in paper.

“My computations!” Mairead screamed, pulling for the dining room.

For a moment Fiona hesitated. Could she trust Mae alone while she rousted Mrs. Quick? Mairead did not handle surprise well.

Fiona followed Mairead into the dining room where the air was still fairly clear. Grabbing up the satchel they used to carry their work back and forth, she began to randomly stuff papers and books inside, along with the astrolabe and compasses.

“No, Fee!” Mairead cried, her hand fluttering uselessly. “I’ll never get them straight.”

“You won’t get them charred, either,” Fiona said, grabbing Mairead’s hand again. “Come along, sweetings. It is time to go.”

The tan-and-pink wallpaper was curling off the walls, and the smoke obscured the top half of the hall. Fiona bent low and pulled Mairead down with her as they ran back for the kitchen.

“Mrs. Quick!”

A thick shadow detached itself from the dark. “What in blazes are you two up to now?” Mrs. Quick demanded as she hopped on one foot, shoving the other into a shoe.

Since the handyman slept out in the mews, this was their complete contingent. Fiona began to relax. At least they would get out.

“Here,” Mairead said, holding the warming pan out to the woman. “I’m no good with these.”

Mrs. Quick didn’t even think to refuse. The three hurried through the darkened kitchen, the increasingly loud flames throwing shadows against the back wall. Fiona saw the door and all she could think was that she needed to get these women out. All else could be taken care of. She had started again before. She would certainly do it again, even though this time she didn’t even have the money her grandfather had given her.

Mairead was the one to reach the door first. With her free hand, she turned the knob and pulled. Fiona had a moment’s thought to what—or who—waited for them outside. After all, that fire had not set itself. Before she could open her mouth to urge caution, though, Mairead was running through the door.

And then, suddenly, Mairead tripped and went sprawling, and Fiona almost went down with her.

They had reached the back garden, which seemed oddly empty and quiet. But there was some obstruction on the ground. Something large and lumpy and soft.

“Mae?” Fiona asked, seeing that her sister was rising to her knees.

There was something on her robe. Something dark and splotchy. Fiona was about to step over whatever was on the ground and see to her sister, when Mairead lifted her hands. And stared. And stared.

“It’s a man,” she said in an oddly dispassionate voice.

Fiona froze. Memories flashed before her; hard, desperate memories, cold, darkness, and little Mae, crouched on the ground. Sobbing. “It’s a man.”

Fiona sucked in a shuddering breath and blinked. Just as she’d shoved her paperwork into that bag, the memories were shoved away where they wouldn’t hurt her. Where they wouldn’t hurt Mae. She bent to see what it was Mairead was staring at.

“Dear sweet Jesus on a cross,” Mrs. Quick breathed, bent over the other side of the big, lumpy, soft obstruction that laid sprawled almost directly across Fiona’s back doorway. “Sweet, sweet Jesus.”

And then she began vomiting in the grass.

Fiona bent closer. The moon spilled gray light, washing away color. It didn’t need it. She knew too well that in the moonlight blood looked black. That dead flesh looked fish white, and that staring dead eyes had no glisten to them. There was no question. The man lying in her back lawn was dead. He was violently, viciously dead, the blood pooled around him like a brutal halo. He was dead because his face had been cut to ribbons, only his staring eyes left intact.

“Fee?
Fee?
Not again!”

In the end, it wasn’t the smoke or flames that brought the neighbors. It was the sound of Mairead’s desperate screaming.

Chapter 9

A
lex downed a bumper of brandy, slammed it on the stained, gouged sticky table, and shoved his money to the center. “All,” he growled, making sure to slur.

Four other men sat at the table with him, all members of the aristocracy out for a bit of slumming, all regular visitors to the Blue Goose. Slouched in their seats, drinks in hand and cravats pulled, they stood out in the tavern like daisies in a garbage heap. Even completely cast away, they couldn’t loosen their posture or dirty their linen enough to make them look native to the dive. Hell, even their faces were too clean.

Their eyes were mean enough, Alex thought, staring down Cyril Weams, a bony, balding, badly dipped second son who frequented taverns like the Goose and won a disproportionate number of times, even from Alex. Especially from Alex lately. It seemed every time Alex arrived at the Goose, Cyril was already there with Bart Smithers and a bumpkin of a baronet named Purefoy they had been sponging from.

Alex knew Weams cheated. He suspected Smithers did as well. This wasn’t the time to call him on it, though. Not when the front door had just opened and a familiar top hat bobbed through.

“Gov,” Alex heard at his elbow.

“Go get him,” Alex said quietly.

Thrasher slipped through the crowd that had gathered around the card game and followed the top hat toward the tap. Alex went about finishing the kill.

“Well, Cyril?” he asked.

Cyril was sweating. Alex didn’t like Cyril. Besides cheating and keeping company with the likes of Bart Smithers, he liked to take advantage of young girls. Alex was happy to take Cyril’s money.

It was winner-take-all on high card. Alex had drawn a knave. Cyril’s fingers hesitated over the deck. Cyril was shoving the rest of his money into the center of the table when Alex saw it.

Oh, hell. Not now.
But he couldn’t ignore so blatant a move. As quick as an adder, Alex slammed a hand down on Cyril’s wrist. The room around him went dead silent.

“Only the cards in the deck, old man,” he drawled, his voice perfectly calm.

Cyril went red. “How dare you…?”

Alex reached his free hand under Cyril’s wrist and drew a king from his sleeve. Cyril howled in protest. Alex ignored him. He was gathering the money and shoving it into a drawstring bag. “Now I know why you prefer the atmosphere at the Goose, Cyril,” he said very gently. “Undoubtedly wise.”

Pandemonium broke out. Cyril jumped up, almost oversetting the table. Glasses splintered. Liquor spilled, adding to the puddles on the floor. Alex refused to react. He simply stood and walked away from the table. Men pounded him on the back. At least three barmaids offered him everything from dinner to having his baby. He ignored them all. He needed to get back to the private room where Thrasher waited with their prey.

He wasn’t a moment too soon. Thrasher had Lennie Wednesday by the collar of his tattered tweed coat, and Lennie wasn’t happy. The only reason Thrasher wasn’t sporting a broken nose was because he could weave faster than Lennie could swing.

“Sit down,” Alex barked.

Both boys stopped. Lennie’s sharp blue eyes got big. “Gor,” he breathed. “You.”

“Yes.” Alex pulled out a chair and sat. “Me.”

Lennie still gaped. Big blue eyes. Smooth cheeks. Layers of oversized clothing topped by a surfeit of worn tweed and that execrable battered top hat shoved low over his ears.

“Thank you, Thrasher,” Alex said, not looking away from the younger boy. “I have this now.”

It was Thrasher’s turn to gape. Alex didn’t blame him. No person of sense should do business without a backup in this neck of the woods. But it wouldn’t do him any good for Thrasher to know this particular business.

“I’ll be out in a minute,” Alex said. “See if you can find a hackney.”

Huffing in outrage, Thrasher slammed out the door. Alex turned back to consider Lennie, who stood balanced on the balls of his feet as if coiling to bolt.

“A big secret, is it, gov?” Lennie asked with a knowing smile.

“Is there any other kind, Lennie?”

Leaning against the wall as if he’d spent a long life propping up buildings, Lennie shrugged. “Don’t let it get around. Might cost ya more.”

“From you?”

“Nuh. I’m an ’onest bloke, I am. Me mam woulda ’ad me lights and liver, other.”

Without waiting for the boy, Alex sat down at the scarred, stained table. “How old are you?” he asked, his attention on the bag of money he was tossing in his palm so that it made a tempting clinking noise.

Lennie’s eyes were riveted on the bag. “Twelve.”

He was ten or Alex was blind. Even so, Alex nodded absently. “Have a seat. I have a proposition for you.” He lifted the bag. “And a bit of memory stimulant.”

Lennie plopped onto a chair as if his knees had given out. “Won’t kill nobody. I got me principles. And I ain’t no nancy boy.”

Alex fought a grin. “I’m glad of that. No. I do not want you to kill anyone. I want you to point someone out for me.”

“The cove what asked me to deliver the message?”

“Yes.”

The boy laughed. “Well, that’s easy ’nuff. You was jus’ playin’ cards with ’im.”

Alex caught his breath. “Which one?”

“Yeller ’air. Bad teeth. Looks like a starvin’ ’ound.”

Alex felt as if he’d been kicked in the gut. “Good God. Cyril Weams?”

The boy shrugged. “If that’s ’is name. Smells like sewage.”

That was him. “Has Weams asked you to deliver messages before?”

His attention on the bulging bag, the boy shrugged. “Coupla times. Coupla punters wiff bad luck. Poncy toff named Evenham. I ’member him special. ’e cried.”

Evenham had also killed himself. Alex still wasn’t sure whether he’d done it because he’d loved another man or because the Lions had used that secret to force him to help liberate Napoleon from Elba.

“Do you remember anyone else?”

The boy’s eyes shifted uneasily. “Naw.”

“Because you have a bad memory, or because it could be injurious to your health to remember?”

For that he got a quick, blinding smile. “You ain’t ’alf-stupid, gov.”

Standing, Alex picked up the bag. “Seems you have a choice, Lennie. You can stay here and take a chance that the people who hired Weams to hire you won’t wish to minimize their risk. Or…” He held up the bag. “You could throw your lot in with me. Regular food, improved working conditions, a chance for advancement.”

His attention still on the bag, Lennie grinned even more broadly. “An’ just f’r the cost of a few names.”

Alex didn’t move. “Ask Thrasher if you want. I don’t lie.”

Alex wasn’t certain why he didn’t want to let this child back onto the streets. The neighborhood was full of them, tough little beasts hardened in flash houses and back alleys. For some reason, this one tugged at something perilous.

“Do you have any family?” he asked.

The boy scowled and looked away. “No.”

There was a story, but Alex didn’t think he’d be the one to get it. Reaching over, he picked up the bag. “Tell you what. I have a friend in Blackheath named Miss Ferguson who needs some help, but doesn’t want to admit it. If you can’t bear life with her, I’ll bring you back myself.”

Lennie’s gaze stayed locked on the money. “What about Weams?”

“I’ll take care of Weams. What do you say?”

Lennie refused to meet his gaze. Even so, the boy gave a quick, jerky nod. Alex tossed over the bag, which was snatched out of the air like a magic trick.

“If you’re smart,” Alex said, “you’ll let Miss Ferguson store this for you. There’s enough there to keep you off the streets.”

The boy sat for a long time, just staring at the plump bag in his long-fingered hands.

Alex nodded and stood. “All right, then. I’d appreciate it if you’d keep this Weams business between us. If you think of any other names, tell no one but me. All right?”

Lennie nodded without looking up.

“What say I take you to my housekeeper tonight, and we’ll visit Miss Ferguson in the morning?”

The boy got to his feet. He really was a little dab of a thing, Alex thought as he walked around to open the door. He hoped to hell the lad could find a way to be comfortable in Fiona’s world.

“Mister?” Lennie whispered as he came level with him. “I think I’m gonna be thankin’ ya.”